CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 1 - Jake

Before I had any time to react, I was getting hit in the face with something.  I guess it was his fist.  I don't even know what set him off.  Maybe the blonde was his girlfriend.  Maybe I just looked like someone who liked getting punched.  Who knows?

I ducked after that.  Actually, I fell, but it was just as effective as ducking.  Then I kicked at his legs and he fell, too.

I grabbed a table for support, pulled myself to my feet and started booking it for the door.  As I ran past the bouncers, I realized they were heading back toward the guy who hit me.  Worked out pretty well.  Hopefully they beat his ass.

I got outside and it was dark, and I was pretty drunk.  It was probably about 12:30.  I slowed down from my stumbling run and just started strolling back in the direction of home.  But now I was pretty adrenaline -filled and pretty (very) drunk, so I didn't really want the night to end just yet.

I sent a couple text messages out, see if anyone was doing anything interesting.  Got the somewhat normal replies of:

"Just heading home now" from Mike.

"No, Jake" from Julie, who must have figured I was booty calling.  Maybe I was?  I don't know.  It's such a thin line between asking a girl to hang out when you're already loaded and booty calling, anyway. Actually, they're exactly the same thing almost all the time.

and "Yea, we're at McGlutty's" from Kevin.  I figured I'd head over to meet up with Kevin.  I don't think anyone I knew was still in Boozers anyway, since I had stayed behind to talk to that girl.  I'm not even sure if either of us knew what the other was saying, we were so sloshed.  I know I didn't know what either of us were saying.  I'm pretty sure my words were incomprehensible.  Luckily I could just reach into her head and pull the thoughts out rather than waiting for her to say them.   Being able to do that helps with the ladies. Although, being drunk still hurts your comprehension skills a bit.

I get to McGlutty's and Kevin and Gary are just sitting there, having a couple beers.  McGlutty's is a pretty standard dive-ish bar. Or as dive-like as they get in Center City, which can be a bit ritzy, depending on the area. There wasn't much beyond a bar in the middle and some (mostly unoccupied) tables around it. Kevin says hi, Gary says hi.  I say hi.  I think we're all pretty hammered.

"We should go get some Jacob's after this" says Gary. Jacob's is a Chinese place over in Chinatown, with a surprisingly Old Testament name.  It's open all night.  Or so.

"I'll probably just go home" I say.  Which is true.  I'm wayyyyy too lazy to make it across town for some Chinese food when I can just go home to my apartment.  Late night eating hasn't been that interesting for the last few years anyway.   Most likely a sign of getting old.

So, I start telling them what happened.

"And then she's talking about some nonsense, I'm not really sure, I think she was a Pharmaceutical salesperson or something.  I don't know, I wasn't really listening.  I was kind of just nodding and waiting for a chance to say something funny.  Or at least funny to me at the time.  She was alright.  Maybe a seven or eight."

Then I get into how the guy ambushed me.  I embellish little, if anything, because I don't really care that the guy obviously got the better of me and I hauled ass out of there.  What was I supposed to do?  For all I knew he had buddies with him.  And anyway, no one wins if we both get arrested or something.

I leave out the parts about reading her thoughts.  They'd probably be confused if I got too into that, and I'm not sure I'm ready to just throw that kind of knowledge around.

I notice Gary's thoughts drifting as he starts checking out some brunette in the corner.  She's sitting with a slightly larger friend.

"We should go talk to those girls over there" he says.

"Naa, I'm pretty much done talking to girls for the night" I respond.  I know Kevin won't want to either, since he and Cathy just broke up and I can tell he's pretty sad about it.  Guess our earlier session of virtually killing teenagers online didn't get rid of all his anxiety.

"Come on."  Gary stands up and starts walking over.

We follow, because why not?  Worst case scenario we can just watch him crash and burn, or who knows, maybe he'll do something great.

We get over near there, and yea, the brunette's not bad at all.  Definitely an eight.  Or I'm drunk.  Whatever.  The other girl, definitely not.

"Come on, let's talk to them" Gary says.  We're standing maybe five feet from them at this point.

"I'll even take the big one,” he continues.

I think they heard that.   Yea, the brunette definitely heard that.

"Uhhh, I think they heard that," Kevin says.

"Whatever," Gary heads in to talk to them.

I don't remember clearly what happened after that, but we were pretty drunk, we didn't go to Jacob's.  Gary didn't get either of the girls, although I feel like the brunette was into me.  Gary and Kevin took the train home, I walked back to my apartment, and went to sleep.